POLICE conducting surveillance at Raymond Terrace last year weren't even looking for drug dealer Zane Christopher Holding.
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But when the 25-year-old emerged from the shadows in Parkway Avenue about 10.40pm on May 29 he walked right into undercover police.
The officers called out to Holding to stop, but he took off and discarded a red bag in the backyard of a nearby home. He was quickly arrested and a search of the bag revealed 100 grams of methamphetamine, 28 grams of cocaine and more than $32,000 in cash.
Holding, of Stockton, appeared in Newcastle Local Court on Wednesday via audio visual link from Nowra Correctional Centre where he pleaded guilty to two counts of supplying a prohibited drug and dealing with the proceeds of crime.
Other charges relating to LSD and buprenorphine found in the bag will be taken into account when he is sentenced in Newcastle District Court later this year.
Police say they were conducting surveillance in an unrelated matter around Parkway Avenue and Wahroonga Street on the night of May 29 when they first spotted Holding walking through the front yard of a home.
The undercover officers may not have looked twice, but Holding appeared to be trying to remain in the shadows and at one point ran across the road before slipping into the shadows again.
Then he walked right up to police, panicked and took off when they told him to stop.
The bag police found was full of drugs, cash, electronic scales and resealable bags.
But prosecutors admit they are unable to exclude the possibility that Holding was acting only as a drug courier when he was arrested by police.
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